In recent years, the following service has been known: A WWW (World Wide Web) browser function is installed in a portable telephone for viewing various pieces of information described in a format of HTML (HyperText Markup Language), etc., existing in WWW servers. The data handled in WWW includes not only text, but also inline images linked in web pages and displayed inline by the WWW browser. Each web page made up of such data assumes that it is displayed by a standard WWW browser installed in a PC (personal computer), and contains a large amount of text and image data.
On the other hand, a simplified browser those function is limited is installed in a portable telephone and memory and physical screen limits are involved in the portable telephone and therefore it is difficult to provide a display form similar to that using a PC. Thus, to display a web page on a portable telephone, an image is not displayed or if an image is displayed, the display area is reduced for displaying the image (scaled-down display) or a part of the image is displayed (partial display), so that the viewability of text information displayed on the screen of the portable telephone is not impaired.
However, even with portable telephones, the demand for aggressively displaying a web page image is strong; in this case, how the image can be displayed efficiently without sacrificing text information, etc., on the limited screen is essential Further, with a terminal capable of displaying a color image, importance of images is high and it is desired that image information should be effectively displayed and utilized like text information.